


Sex After Sykes

by deathtodickens



Series: Unscenes: A Canon-ish Fix [3]
Category: Warehouse 13
Genre: Angst, F/F, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-18
Updated: 2014-05-18
Packaged: 2018-01-25 14:35:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,178
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1652165
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deathtodickens/pseuds/deathtodickens
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Takes place after 4x01 "A New Hope" and maybe-kinda-sorta explains why Myka looks so undone in 4x02 "An Evil Within".  I think the title says it all, but there is a great deal of dialogue.  This is the third part in a series and will make more sense if you've read the first two stories, Six Flights of Stairs and Five Hours Home, beforehand.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sex After Sykes

**Author's Note:**

> Clearly these characters are not mine. I'm just doing with them whatever I please. If there are inaccuracies, I am afraid I cannot apologize for that, but hopefully they don't ruin the entire experience.

The down side to having an eidetic memory while working in law enforcement is the inability to erase the tragic faces of people you meet, and the thing about having a career in law enforcement is the majority of your encounters with people, civilians in general, are negative or centered around some unfortunate event.

You're meeting people on the worst day of their lives; the worst comprehensible day of their too-carefully-planned, sheltered, and overly-censored lives. And while we, the enforcers of law, spend all of our time dipping into this world of other people's worst days and thickening our skin against the evidential needle-pricks of mortality, "other people" are becoming ruined, aggrieved, and forever changed.

You see it in their faces; turmoil, despair, grief, exhaustion, loss, denial, catastrophe.

One thousand different feelings behind brown eyes, blue eyes, green eyes, pink skin, brown skin, lenses, face lifts, false smiles, bruised cheeks, bloodied lips, breathless lips, broken limbs, lifeless bodies.

All suffocating and drowning and desperate to go back in time, to change the past, to alter the future, to undo the pain. Staring if not glaring, asking silent questions, pleading for answers.

Even the dead faces are pleading for answers. They never go away. They just sort themselves into appropriate areas of the subconscious mind until they feel the need to resurface, unbidden, lively and unrepentant, and at the most inconvenient of times. In dreams, at dinner, in the middle of a really good book, throughout other cases, whilst buried in inventory, and, all too often, in your thoughts of others.

Such has always been the case with my thoughts of Helena.

Helena, whose beautifully crafted face also happens to be the most haunting of all these faces.

The hardest to forget.  
  
  
***  
  


"Myka."

It isn't the first time our eyes meet since she's returned to her physical form, but it's the first time that things aren't rushed, that everything is calm, and we aren't in a hurry to save another piece of the world. Or destroy it, as the case has historically proven to be at times.

She's pulling purple gloves from her hands and shoving them into her pockets. Her eyes glance down at the lifeless body of the former Walter Sykes, where I'm kneeling and thinking too much as another lifeless face catalogs itself into the recesses of my mind for later haunts.

Helena kneels beside me and her hand on my arm seems to complete an errant connection between my thoughts and my lips.

"I'm trying to wrap my mind around the fact that a sheet just saved our lives."

She lets out a soft, nasally laugh and the sound of her genuine happiness pulls my thoughts out of the dark place they had been and back to the beauty before me that is Helena Wells.

She smiles, a brow arching curiously, when she sees me staring at her.

"Hey." It's a whisper when she says it.

"Hi." I'm grinning now, I know it.

"How about we cover Mr. Sykes until the Regents send in the cleaning crew?" She looks down on him with something like a mix of pity and sorrow. "I mean, just in case. You can never be too sure."

I lift the sheet back over Walter Sykes' face, remove my own gloves and force myself to my feet.  I hold a hand out to the woman beside me, who takes it without question and stands, too. For a second, a silence hovers between us, but she takes a step toward me with an outstretched hand as if to touch my face, but stops at the sound of approaching voices.

Artie and Pete can be heard bickering around a corner, and they're unknowingly ruining perfect moments because she retracts her hand and crosses her arms in front of her as they appear from an aisle with a container of goo and the now-dismantled bomb that almost ended us.

The bickering stops when they spot us staring at them, and I'm sure it's because neither Helena nor I are all that great at disguising our annoyance at their intrusion. They stare back with the renewed realization that they may have quite possibly just walked onto a field of active mines.

I cross my arms and I can almost hear Pete's gulp from where I stand, several feet away.

"So, who's ready for lunch?" He says, clapping his hands together to break the silence.

"Oh, I'll make cookies."

"I actually haven't eaten in an _year_ , I'm famished."

All three of them are speaking at once against the tension and I roll my eyes. It's fine, though, because I don't exactly have wild dreams of being overly affectionate with anyone in the presence of the recently deceased.

 

The warehouse is a massive place and without the zip line, or the Segway, or any number of teleportation artifacts, and body-powered transportation devices, it's also a journey getting from point A to point B.

Artie has bagged and tagged the bomb along the way, Pete announces on more than one occasion that he's starting to get hangry and insists on a multitude of non-existent shortcuts. Even suggests that Artie install moving walkways in every other aisle and set them to warp speed. Artie doesn't exactly say no.

Helena is quiet, walking slightly ahead of me with her arms still crossed in front of her. Every now and then, she laughs at Pete's jokes or looks back at me with an eye roll when Artie is his typical grumpy self. But she mostly stays silent and invisible to the two men who are steps ahead of us.

"Finally!" Pete cheers when the office comes into view. His pace turns into a run with a grumbling Artie slightly-less-than fast on his heels, already threatening him about the perils of eating cookie dough mix.

"I think I need a bath." Helena starts to pick up her pace as well but I catch her left arm, before she can take off, and pull her into another aisle and around a corner. "Myka, what..." Her protest falls short when I turn to her, hands finding her hips, and gently back her up against a support beam. She inhales deeply at the intimacy in this contact.

I feel her body tremble.

She closes her eyes and takes in another long, shaky breath before opening her eyes to me and then she smiles, like she's finally "getting it."

"You're really here." It's a whisper.

"Myka." A smirk slowly appears across her lips, she laughs softly. "You know that crooked smile of yours," she begins, "will always be the absolute death of me. You're like a child in a shop full of sweets."

I'm grinning again, then biting my bottom lip.

"Well, I don't normally eat sugar..."

 _Well then._ That's the look her face makes right now. She says nothing, her cheeks _actually_ flush.

"Score one for Myka." I say softly and she laughs again through her nose.

Her eyes fall to my lips and her smile fades before our eyes meet again.

She leans forward slowly, cautiously, but stops short, eyebrows wrinkling before she decides to speak.

"Are you still punishing yourself?" There's worry on her voice and a puff of laughter escapes me. Her smile returns but her eyes are still reflecting concern and she brings her hands to my forearms, squeezes gently.

I see a flash of Emily Lake and I shake my head, both to answer her question and rid my mind of thoughts of Emily. Of Helena as Emily.

We stay like this, silent and adjusting to the reality of our proximity to one another. The lack of urgency is almost unsettling. We are so used to always moving, always running, always going some place or doing some _thing_ , that neither of us knows how to properly be still. How to use all of these moments that aren't being measured or timed or clocked or counted down.

She speaks first to break the silence, "It won't be long before Mrs. Frederic comes looking for me..." She stops suddenly, watching me, and arches her brow. "No?"

I realize I'm shaking my head at her, trying not to hear her words, pushing thoughts of Mrs. Frederic away now, too. Just more faces haunting me in the absence of themselves.

"No." I echo. "We deserve this."

"Deserve what, exactly?" It sounds challenging but her curious smile is genuine.

"To stand still." I say. "For just one second."

I pull her hips closer and it's almost funny how effortlessly she steps into me as I wrap my arms around her waist. My hands resting against the small of her back hold the warmth of her body steadily against mine. That brow of hers goes soaring again, a smirk playing across her lips, and she starts to say something along the lines of properly courting her over dinner, but I cut her off with my lips against hers and the thought evaporates into a soft whimper.

Her hands slide slowly up my arms and against the sensitive skin of my neck. She pulls me in closer, parting her lips, and silently begging for more contact than this.

I don't deny her. Not like before.

My lips against hers pulls me back to the day before, to Wisconsin, and stairwells, and Emily Lake, the innocent, frightful American high school English teacher, and her teasing, her touching, her kissing me. Had I kissed her back? And for some reason, the thought of Emily becomes a driving force in this kiss, when I realize she's not Helena and Helena is not her. She's someone entirely different, a Helena sans the pain, born in the 20th century, untouched by loss but equally fragile and carrying that same level of need to be close to someone.  Endlessly craving human contact.

I realize she's not Helena, and then I realize she's gone, and she's gone forever. Frightened and fragile Emily is gone, she died when Helena's conscious mind returned to her self, and it's the most ridiculous shit in the world but I mourn her. I mourn the loss of Emily Hannah Lake, because she was an innocent bystander in all of this, her own person taking up temporary residence in Helena's body.  
  
Just another casualty in the aftermath of the Regents' thoughtless power, the blind swinging of their gavels by self-appointed judges and juries. Another casualty at Helena's expense.

And now I'm mourning Helena, because they've destroyed her again and this time she doesn't even seem to know it.

Helena breaks our kiss, but she doesn't pull completely away. She brings her hands to the sides of my face, palming my cheeks, and leaving soft kisses over my lips. She kisses my bottom lip, the place below my lips, the corner of my mouth. She pulls me closer to her, forcing me to bend slightly to her height, and kisses my forehead, the closed lids of my eyes, each of my cheeks.

And she's so fucking delicate about it, so gentle, and polite, and loving, that it's almost unbearable how I can feel her wanting me. How I can feel her need for me in every single kiss.

"It's been too long." She whispers these words with her mouth so close to mine.

Her thumbs stroke my cheeks gently, before she kisses my lips once again, and then she lowers a hand to my chest, just over my heart, and taps a playful finger against exposed skin there. Her other hand at the back of my neck allows stray fingers to tease small curls in my hair.

"It would seem that I have become quite adept at making you cry."

I open my eyes to her voice and she reaches up to wipe my tears away.

"Do you remember being Emily?" I ask. Her eyes widen at the question and then turn thoughtful but the smile she gives me speaks to sadness or maybe even guilt, as she seems to process the deeper meaning behind the question. She shakes her head.

"I don't." She answers. More tears slip from my eyes and she wipes those away, too. I hold her tighter, if it's even possible, and she rests her head against my shoulder, the bridge of her nose pressed gently to my neck.

"I've missed you too much." I tell her.

"Apparently, I'm not the only _me_ that you're missing." I feel her smile against my neck and she kisses the skin there. A very distinct shudder rushes through my body.

"You should be happy to know that you're universally charming." She laughs at that.

"I had no doubt of that, my Darling Myka."

"And universally modest." I tease.

"Myka." She tightens her grasp on me. "If more than one version of me has had the pleasure of your affection, I'm absolutely certain that it is _you_ who is the charming one."

I can't help the smile. She kisses my neck again and holds on tighter.

"And I have missed you, too." She adds. "More than you can truly know."

We stand this way, still and devouring this new concept of time, for several moments before the warehouse becomes too quiet.

"We should go." I suggest, kissing her temple. "Before Mrs. Frederic finds you."

"Too late."

The voice is so startling from beside us that we jump apart, Helena launching herself straight into the support beam behind her.

"Holy shit!" "Bollocks!" We're shouting at once.

I catch Helena as she falls forward after bouncing off of the column. Her hand is on the back of her head, nursing the pain there, and we are, quite humorously, back in nearly the same position we started in.

"Fucking fuck."

"Helena." I say it as a gentle reminder of present company.

Mrs. Frederic has something resembling amusement on her face, a look that, on any other person, might present itself more like a scowl.

"Agent Bering."

If I didn't know any better, I would say she's stifling a laugh.

"Mrs. Frederic." I know my smile is awkward and my face is red hot from the sudden rush of blood.

"HG Wells."

Helena is slightly more composed than I am in this moment, with exception to the last few swear words she says, under her breath and into my shoulder, before turning to the source of the current hour's near-death experience.

"Irene."

"The Janus coin?" Helena stands straight now but doesn't break our contact. Instead, her fingers find their way into the belt loop of my pants and she tugs me closer. I smile at the hint of possessiveness.

"I'm afraid I don't have it." She answers. "Perhaps Mr. Sykes pocketed it on the way to China."

Mrs. Frederic remains quiet, and examining. She watches Helena for a moment before her eyes fall on me, then back to Helena.

"The Regents will want to remand you while they decide your fate from here, Miss Wells." Helena and I both begin our protest in unison but Mrs. Frederic raises a brow and a palm to us and, all at once, we both fall quiet. "They won't arrive until tomorrow morning, so I've volunteered, against even my own better judgment, to keep a watchful eye on you until then."

"What does that mean?" I ask.

"It means that Mrs. F and I will be having one of Pete's and Claudia's so-called slumber parties toni..."

"Where are you going to take her?" Mrs. Frederic sighs at the onslaught of questions and commentary. This time we shut up before she can scold us.

"I have actually made the _very_ generous and _liberal_ decision to _allow_ you to stay in Agent _Bering_ 's charge for the evening." She stresses a lot of the words in that statement and I know, without ever looking, that Helena's mouth is as wide as mine, because neither of us says a thing for a good ten seconds.

"Is that a fact?" It takes Helena a while to find these words, and that is rare.

"I trust you'll see to it that Miss Wells stays put until the Regents' arrival at Leena's tomorrow?"

"Yes. Ma'am. Yes, ma'am, Mrs. Frederic." Because when I'm at a loss for words, I'm not as graceful as Helena, and am more apt to sound like a bumbling fool.

"And I'm sure Agent Bering won't mind extending the use of her space and her time to you for one evening." This time, I do look at Helena and her eyes are so wide and bewildered that I have to stifle my laughter and then, somehow, I'm less bumbling than she.

"I don't mind at all." I answer.

"Good then."

"I still have all your clothes anyway." Now Helena's bewildered look falls on me, she arches her brow, and smirks and I know, by that look, that I'll be interrogated later. So, I offer an explanation, " _Someone_ had to empty your room."

Of course, it's not good enough.

"And you drew the shortest of all the sticks?" Helena finally returns to herself, misquoted phrases and all.

"Well, no, I volunteered, but it's only because you... I mean, your journal... and I didn't want Artie to... you know, throw all of your belongings into the warehouse furnace."

"A discussion for later... this evening, perhaps?" She raises her brows and nods back toward Mrs. Frederic but, in true caretaker fashion, she has already disappeared.

"Is it just me," I start, "or did she just basically tell us to..."

"I believe she has given us specific instructions to enjoy our evening."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

"We have time." It's difficult to believe, even when I say it out loud. Helena's hand in my hand pulls me from my thoughts.

"I don't suppose we should disappoint her then." Her smile is huge and coy and her eyes full of mischief and perhaps that's longing I see.

"Oh." It's all I can say before she's pulling me into another deep kiss.  
  
  
***  
  


Mrs. Frederic is in Artie's office when we leave, and chastises our dawdling when Artie pulls Helena aside to express something akin to gratitude. Mrs. Frederic hints to the regent Kosan's pending arrival and disguises her attempts to rush us out of the warehouse as a rant about warehouse agents having to keep a level of decorum, wherein both hygiene and a proper diet are a must.

She loans us her driver because my car is still parked at the airport in Featherhead and Pete has left long ago with the promise of celebratory Leena-baked sweets upon his arrival to the B&B.

Mrs. Frederic's driver will probably ask for a raise after what he's witnessed in the short fifteen minute drive back to Leena's. Helena is insatiable and there's little I can do to convince her to keep her clothes on inside the car, aside from telling her that we deserve better than Mrs. Frederic's limousine and an audience during our first time together.

Needless to say, a few items of clothing are thrown back on inside-out by the time we pull up to the B&B.

She contains herself, mostly, until we make it inside and manage to slip past Pete, who is already in a food coma and napping on the couch, and we sneak quietly up the stairs. Her hands are on my hips when she pulls me into my room and closes the door by pushing me back into it. All at once her mouth is against my neck, kissing and biting and sucking and licking but mostly she's biting and I think I might like that too much. One hand is on my back, the other snaking it's way behind my thigh and lifting my leg up and around her.

"Helena." I'm breathless and I'm aroused and I want her and all of this, but she's still insatiable and it's too fast and too careless. It's been too long for us to move this way. Too long for me, even.

"I need you, Myka." She says between kissing and nipping, her touch softening only slightly before she drives her hips forward and between my thighs, and if not for her hold, I would surely be on the ground. The most helpless whimper escapes my lips, and it only serves to fuel her passion.

My fingers find their own way into her hair, pulling her closer and bringing her lips back to mine, directing her kisses where I need them to be. She moans softly, bites softly against my bottom lip, and pushes her thigh into me. The sound that escapes me is so foreign, so full of want, that it startles even me.

I break off our kiss, desperate for oxygen, and breathe wildly as she watches me, studying my face, eyes on my lips, my chest, my lips again, and back to my eyes.

"You're crying again." She's breathing hard and looking confused but she presses her forehead to mine.  The next kiss is gentle.

"Too. Fast." I pant. Her face falls as she steps back, breaking off all contact, and I slump slowly to the floor. She steps backward until her calves hit my bed and she drops herself into a seated position and bends forward with her elbows on her knees and her hands in her hair.

"Myka." She looks up at me through hair that falls over her face. My heart is still racing, so much of me still throbbing and aching for contact. "Myka, I need you. I need..." Then she cries and it quickly turns to sobbing and she looks like she's about to crumble to the floor.

I will the strength back into my legs and walk to her, drop to my knees in front of her, and grab her wrists, pulling her hands from her face.

"Helena." She looks up at me with red eyes and wet cheeks, I smile and she does smile, too, but it's forced and masking too many emotions. "Helena, we have time."

She shakes her head. "But we don't." She says. "Not enough. Not you and me, Myka Bering." Something seems to spark in her memory then and she reaches into the pocket of her jeans, tossing purple gloves to the floor. She checks her back pockets, coming up empty handed, then reaches into her bra and pulls out a folded piece of paper and sighs, a genuine smile finally taking over.

She sniffs against tears and unfolds the paper with a familiar gloss to it. She's grinning now and turns the photo around to show me.

"I found this in my bra. While in China." She laughs. "I think Emily has been holding onto it. To you."

It's the same photo of us that Claudia had left in Artie's office, the day the regents took her away. But how had Emily Lake kept it? And why?

An even better question would be, why hadn't she mentioned it? Or maybe she had planned to, when _she_ thought we had more time.

"Emily knew the whole time that she knew me from before?" I ask it quietly.

I take the photo and smile.  
  
We were happy, Helena and I, sitting in our favorite room of the B&B, on our favorite over-sized love seat, just being together in a common routine, reading and discussing and theorizing and analyzing. I remember the day because it was such a rare day with no pings and no errands, no chores, no Pete around to get some part of himself stuck into some foreign object.

Claudia was tinkering with one of Artie's old non-artifact cameras that he professed hadn't worked for years and was to remain forever busted. Claud had taken it as a challenge. A challenge that she defeated in less than one hour, evidenced by the photo that I was now holding between Helena and I.

"No, Claud."

"Yes, just one photo! Come on, I want it to be a good one, so I can rub it in Artie's face extra good." She sounds off an evil laugh and Helena is bumping into my shoulder with hers.

"One picture, Myka." She says. "I don't believe I actually have a photo of myself that's in color."

"See, HG needs a color photo and who better to take it with than her best gal pal?"

I roll my eyes, but there is something particularly intriguing about the idea of having a photo with HG Wells, even if no one else would get it, really.

Before I can surrender, Helena is yelling, "Now, Claud!" And her arms are around me, her lips are against my cheek, and there's a giant smile plastered on my face as the flash goes off. All this swiftly followed by my own false protests and a cackling, fleeing Claudia.

"You got me good." I tell Helena now. She laughs but looks away and wipes at tears. "Come here." I tell her, setting the photo on the bed and wrapping my arms around her waist. She watches me with quiet curiosity as I tug her hips forward until she's off the bed and straddling my lap on the floor with her back against the bed. "You and I..." I smirk. "We are always moving too fast."

She's quiet, still watching me, and I sigh, shaking my head.

"You and I, we need to slow down." I kiss her then, it's gentle and soft, and when we part I taste the salt of her tears that are left against my lips. She smiles, and kisses me, too, as gently as she can and without the prior urgency.

"I'm sorry, Myka."

"No." I kiss her. "Stop apologizing." I narrow my eyes at her. "Every time you apologize, you disappear."

"I'm..." She stops herself short. "I need you to know how much I regret hurting you. Before. I need you to know how much I regret so much of what I do, what I have done to you."

"I know." I kiss her cheek. "I know, Helena. You've more than proven yourself."

"No, you don't." She shakes her head. "Not now, but hopefully in the future." I squeeze my arms around her, pulling her in close and hugging her tightly. She hugs back, then sighs as I kiss her ear.

"I've missed you so much, Helena Wells."

   
***  
  


We decide to take Mrs. Frederic's advice and work on our hygiene. Also, there has been no time for that since China and the dust from secret ancient Chinese caverns is beginning to set off one very allergic-to-everything time traveler's sinuses.

Helena sneezes.

"Bless you." I smile against her temple as she rests her back against me once again, causing ripples in warm bath water. I wrap my arms back over her chest and she brings her hands up to grasp my wrists.

"Don't waste your blessings on me, Myka darling." She laughs. "I'm hardly worth saving."

"Helena. It's just another thing people say."

"I know, Darling, I'm not _that_ old."

I kiss the dampness on her temple, the salt of her sweat against my lips makes me smile more.

"Does it defeat the purpose of bathing if we end up more sweat-drenched than we were before we got into the tub?" It's like she's reading my mind and I laugh into her hair and kiss behind her ear.

My mind is still desperately filing away all of the beautiful images of her and the sounds that had escaped her lips as we had, in her words, scandalized the bath tub.

There's one of her bare chest, rising and falling, then rising and falling in slow steady breaths, playing against the surface of the water.  The push of her hips, desperate against my fingers that are lost beneath curls and playing gingerly on invisible buttons.  Her hand, grasping, and gripping tightly over mine which is lost inside of her, almost as if directing my fingers, forcing their movements, refusing to let go. The playing of those delicate spaces that spark her arousal and feed her growing hunger.

Ghosts of tiny whimpers and sultry moans, abated only partially by her teeth digging into her bottom lip, then my mouth against hers, then her teeth at my neck. Fingernails of her free hand dragging desperately against the skin of my legs. How the pain only drives me.

The way my name, barely audible, escapes her lips, breathless and pleading and commanding, demanding even, all at once.

The sound of turbulent water, swaying against our combined rhythms. Her feet pushing, strained with the building pleasure, against the far end of the bath. The feel of her hands reaching behind my head to pull our lips together, as she almost quietly begs me not to stop. As she opens her legs wider, pleads slightly louder, pushes harder.

Then she reaches her peak.  And there's only the way her body tenses and shakes above me with the combination of all these things, and she relaxes into me with exhaustion and finality, but my name still echoes on her lips, breathless, throaty, intoxicated.

And I don't file that one away. Not yet.

I let that one sit fresh at the forefront of my mind, replaying the moment again and again. Using it as a reminder of the woman above me, of all that she's given me, of all I've had the deepest pleasure of taking from her.

"Stop being everything to me." I tell her, after replaying the last scene in my mind again, and kiss her hair. "Then we won't have these issues. Of having to re-bathe."

"Be careful what you ask for, Myka." She says it quietly, in that melancholy voice she's become so accustomed to using. I want to ask her what she means, but I let the moment slip by in favor of just holding her in silence, recovering from the exhaustion.

After a while, she's stretching her neck back in order to see me. "Wake up."

"I'm very much awake." I squeeze her body in closer to mine and kiss her lips before she returns to resting her head against my shoulder.

"We should eat."

I laugh. "We should."

"I mean _actual_ food." She says.

"Of course, me too."

"Maybe order in that God-awful Chinese food you love so much?" I laugh at her suggestion.

"You mean the one and only Chinese restaurant in town? The one that has actually added a 'Helena Special' to their menu underneath the 'Pete Plattermer'?  _That_ God-awful Chinese food place?"

"No, they didn't."

They actually hadn't, but the Pete Plattermer was truly a thing, and Helena had taken to Chinese food so quickly as her choice junk food, that they had just as quickly memorized her order.

"I think the owner is a fan of yours."

"Of my books?"

"No, Helena." I laugh. "Most certainly not of your _books_. Unless that's what you're calling them these days."

At that, she spins herself around in the tub, her nude figure stretched out over me, straddling my waist, breasts pressed firmly to mine, and she leans in close to kiss me. She smiles when we part. "Are _you_ a fan of my books?"

"I'm a fan of far more than your books." I smile. She licks her lips and there's no hiding the chill that runs through my body, it ripples water, and she smiles, kisses me again.

"I owe you so much." She says softly, her eyes moving from mine to my lips and back to my eyes.

"No, Helena." I smile. "I owe _you_. Remember?"

She kisses me and, despite the cooling bath water, wrinkling skin, and several knocks on the door that go completely ignored, she continues to collect on that debt.

 

I'm wrapped in a towel and helping Helena dry off when another hard knock comes at the door. "Here." I hand her the towel to wrap around herself.

"Myka. You've been in there for like an hour already. It's called the 'women's' restroom because it is, in fact, meant to be used by more than one woman." It's Claudia's voice but absent any hint of her usual optimism and filled to the brim with the type of annoyance she typically reserves for Pete in one of their post-game brawls.

I open the door too wide and Helena is behind me, kissing my cheek and pushing me out of the bathroom. Claudia's face morphs from surprise into a hint of a smirk but then falls again.

"Hello, Claudia, Darling."

"HG." There's a hint of adoration masked in her voice.

"I don't believe the concept of a women's restroom is at all lost on our dear Myka." She teases. I playfully elbow her abdomen and she hums out a laugh.

"Sorry, Claud, we were just..." I'm not even sure why I start the sentence in the first place.

"Myka's meant to be my charge until the Regents arrive to lock me up again." Helena offers. Claudia's eyebrows rise and then fall as she looks between us.

"Well, it's nice to see someone is getting a somewhat happy ending." The pain in her voice sends a wave of guilt through me but she almost sounds genuine, too.

"Oh, Claudia." I say moving forward to hug her but she holds her hand up and let's out an amused laugh.

"Oh, nooo. That's quite all right, Myka." She says. "You can save the rubbing of the lady bits for HG. I'm more than capable of handling my own grief."

"I'm sorry, Claudia." I offer again, and Helena is pushing me further out of the bathroom now.

"How about we retreat behind closed doors and allow Claudia some space." Claudia is moving past me, toward the bathroom, but Helena stops her momentarily, watches her silently as Claudia's eyes seem to glisten. She kisses her forehead and leans in close to her to whisper and all I can hear is, "...em back."

Whatever she says, Claudia nods then blinks and a tear slips down her cheek. Then she wraps her arms around Helena in a hastened hug before she retreats into the bathroom.

"What was _that_?" I ask her as she leads me back into my bedroom with her hand at the small of my back.

"I owe Claudia, too." She says.

"Okay." I smile as she pushes me into my room and closes the door. "As long as you're not repaying everyone the exact same way."

"Don't be cheeky." She warns with a smile and walks toward my closet. "Now, about my clothes." She looks back at me over her shoulder and throws my closet doors open.

"Helena." I begin in protest but she's already grinning at the way her clothes are arranged, neatly hanging on one side of the closet while mine occupy the other side. Our shoes are in much the same fashion at the closet floor.

Anyone else would be incapable of knowing the clothes belong to two different people.

"You've always been a bit... _orderly_ , haven't you?" She begins pushing hangers to and fro and I'm more than certain her actions are purposeful and meant to be irritating. "But I think I'll wear this one."

"That's _my_ shirt, Helena." She puts it on anyway.

"Not any more, Darling." She smiles coyly. "You're the one who decided to marry our wardrobes, what's mine is yours and all that?" She's buttoning up the blouse already. "And about my knickers."

" _Yours_ ," I say loudly, walking to my dresser, "are right here."

"So, you kept those, too?" She smirks. "Rather optimistic, aren't we?"

"I kept everything, and you're here aren't you?" I tell her. "Mind you, more than a few of those things, I happen to know, were taken from your house-turned-museum in London and are, in fact, stolen items."

"Yes, they are stolen." She's rifling through the drawer now. "Stolen from _me_ and now returned to their rightful owner."

She's slipping into boy shorts now, her eyes on mine the entire time.

"You're infuriating."

"You've told me a million times." She grins, reaching back into the drawer and dangling a pair of my own underwear before me. "Shall we dine?"

I'm glaring at her and reach for the underwear, tossing them across the room, and letting my towel drop to the floor.

We don't quite make it downstairs, but we do dine.  
  
  
***  


"Let's try this again, shall we?" Somehow we manage to both have blouses and underwear on. It's a step in the right direction. We are standing by my bed and I'm buttoning the last button that I'm willing to button on my blouse that she wears.

When I finish, I find her eyes on me and they look almost peaceful but somehow still saying more than Helena ever bothers to actually say.

"You okay?" She nods at my question. "Okay." She stands on the tips of her toes and kisses me. The height difference isn't that great, but she seems to take a small pleasure in making herself exactly my height.

"Myka Bering." It's all she says before kissing me again.

A knock at the door breaks the sentimental moment and Pete's groggy voice is calling my name.

"Allow me." Helena rushes to the door.

"Helena, we're not even dressed..." But the door, again, swings wide open and Pete is standing there with eyes just as wide, looking at Helena, glancing at me, averting his eyes to Helena. And then, because it takes him a while, a huge grin takes over his face.

"This is happening." He says.

"I'm afraid it has already happened." Helena says with a slight shrug of her shoulder. "Several times, in fact."

And just when I think Pete is going to be Pete and say something vulgar or embarrassing or call the entire house to my bedroom door to make witness, he's pulling Helena into a huge hug, wrapping his arms so tightly around her, and so quickly, that Helena is frozen and unmoving for a good few seconds before she awkwardly returns the gesture.

"Uh, Peter..." She starts.

"Okay, Pete. Okay." I step closer in an attempt to rescue her but he unlatches one arm and pulls me into the hug alongside her. "Oh, okay. This is really happening right now." He squeezes both of us tightly against his chest right before finally letting go and placing a hand on either of our shoulders.

He nods. Maybe even sniffles.

"Leena made dinner." He says just before a crooked smile forms. "That is, if you ladies aren't already full." He wags a brow suggestively.

"Well, I could always go for seconds..." Helena starts.

"Done!" I yell, interrupting them both before they get any more out of hand. "So done. Stop talking. You, go back downstairs." Pete pouts. "You, get some pants on." Helena pouts, too. "We'll be down shortly."

I slam the door on Pete before he can say anything more but I hear his muffled testament anyway,

"I am going to have _so_ much fun with this."

 

By the time we do make it downstairs, Pete is stuffing the last bit of his spinach lasagna down his throat, but decides to stick around while Helena and I eat, because he obviously has been working on his repertoire of queer jokes for quite some time and needs an audience.

Helena finds this to be a more than acceptable way to spend our time eating dinner. I opt to engage Leena in small conversation, but she seems worried about something and is easily distracted by Pete's self-amusement.

I ask her if she's spoken to Claudia and she only looks at me with sad eyes and shakes her head. Helena pats my leg and holds my hand under the table and says to give Claudia time. Pete reminds us all how hellbent she is on reversing the damage that has been done.

Leena speaks enough to tell us that she's been sitting in Steve's room since just after knowing the warehouse was safe and Walter Sykes was dead. Apparently, she hugged and thanked Pete upon his arrival, shoved a plate full of cookies into his arms, and hasn't been seen since.

"Artie's going to have to move Steve's room to the DAV with her sitting in it." Pete's chewing on a stray bite of lasagna that he's plucked from Helena's plate with his own fork, leaving the most disgusted look I have ever seen cross her face.

"Did you not already eat half the pan?" She asks him. "I haven't eaten _actual food_ in nearly a year, and you're taking food from my plate?"

"Sawr-eh." That's how an apology sounds from Pete's mouth when it's full of food.

"You're an _animal_." She scoffs but smirks just before sliding her plate closer to him and I'm surprised she's eaten as much as she has.  Pete is so quick to take her offering that I'm almost certain she nearly lost her hand to his fork.

"Maybe we should talk to her?" I suggest, breaking up their lover's quarrel.

"Just give her some space." Helena begins. "She'll come around eventually. She just needs time to properly grieve." The way she says it sounds unsure, like she's saying it for me and not because she believes it to be true.

"I'm just worried. I don't want her to do anything drastic."

"Such as?"

All of our heads turn to the doorway as the lights flicker and a clap of thunder rather conveniently duets Claudia's caretaker-esque arrival. She's standing there with narrowed eyes, looking amongst us carefully, and seems to recoil slightly at our general togetherness.

"Claud." Leena's the only one to speak.

The lights flicker again.

"Where's Artie?" She asks staring only at Leena, who stands rather quickly to go to her side.

"Still at the warehouse, speaking with Mrs. Frederic, I imagine." She places a hand at Claudia's back. "You should eat something, Claud."

"I'm not hungry."

"You really should, Claudia, before Pete devours the entire dish." Helena smiles as Pete finishes off the rest of the food on her former plate.

"If a girl not hungry, a girl not hungry." Apparently a mouth full of food also diminishes ones knowledge of the English language.

"I just need to steal HG from you for two seconds." Claudia says, looking to me now.

"Oh, I... go ahead."

"Sure, Claudia." Helena doesn't hesitate to stand and follows Claudia out of the room, leaving Leena puffing out a sigh and returning to her seat.

"That girl." It's all she says.

It's around five minutes before Helena returns to the dining area and I pull myself from the table and to my feet.

"Where is she?" I ask.

"Myka, just give her..." Helena has her hands up in an attempt to stop me.

"Space? Helena? It sounds like you keep asking me to let her marinate in her own misery. Alone?" She says nothing else because loneliness and grief are two things she knows well.  She points back toward the stairs where Claudia is beginning her ascension.

"Claudia!" I call, she takes two steps at a time. "Claud stop, I know you can hear me." She does stop then and pivots to face me. Suddenly, I feel like a mother scolding her teenager, so I adjust my tone and meet her on the landing.

"Yes, Mom?" It makes me cringe.

"Look, Claudia, I'm..." I sigh and reach my hands out to her shoulders. "I don't have the right words for you, Claudia. There's nothing I can say that will make this any less hard. It hurts now and it's just going to keep hurting. But I need you to know that you're not alone." She rolls her eyes at that and looks away. "Claud, look at me." She does. "You're in a house full of people who know what loss is, Claud. We know it well."

Helena is suddenly behind me, with a hand on my shoulder. Claudia looks to her for a moment before turning her eyes to the floor.

"I'm not going to tell you not to try to bring him back. I'm only going to tell you to make damn sure you know what you're doing when you do." She nods at that. "We all loved... _love_ Steve." I make my voice softer. "But we love you, too. You know how dangerous artifacts can be, you know they almost all come at a price. Just please... please, be careful."

She's wiping away tears in her eyes, nodding, and maybe even smiling. I pull her closer, hug her tight, kiss her forehead, because I see her youthfulness slowly being chipped away by the reality that comes with a government job and with adulthood and with living life in general. And Claudia has certainly had her share of tragedy and loss, but she's not had to face it or stare it directly in the eyes.

Not until Steve.

And now she's spiraling, like any of us would do or have done. She just needs to know when to pull up before she hits the ground.

"I'm sorry, Claud, that I haven't said this before now." She's shaking her head and Helena steps into this hug, holding us both tight. We stay that way for a while.

"Please, don't tell Leena." Claudia says it softly as we all move apart. Both Helena and I nod but I have a feeling Helena knows more about what not to tell than I do. "She'll be super pissed." She actually laughs at that. "I have some tinkering to do." She says and with a smile, she turns to head the rest of the way up the stairs. She stops momentarily when she reaches the top and looks back at us with a smirk, "You're the best moms a girl could ask for."

Claudia disappears into the hallway and behind a door before the flush even reaches my cheeks. I look to Helena, who is biting back a smile and then says, "She could be ours."

"Oh, hush." But I'm grinning with pride.

  
***  
  


Upstairs, we shed our clothes again. We make love and Helena turns into a force not to be reckoned with. She seems almost to be channeling all of her emotions from Yellowstone directly into me, and I am honest when I say I have not one single complaint.

She's relentless, even when gentle. When one wave of an orgasm hits me, she doesn't stop what she's doing to me until the second follows. There's a thunderstorm in full effect outside, and I'm saying silent prayers for every loud crash that muffles the cries I can't seem to hold back.  
  
At some point, when I cry out so loudly that I'm certain Pete is never going to let me live it down, the power goes completely out and, even with her face buried in curls between my legs, she has the nerve to stop what she's doing and take credit.

"Darling, we've shut off the lights."

"Helena." It's a soft plea against the absence of her inside of me, and I want to cry. I think I actually do.

"Credit where credit is due, Myka."

"Shut up." I tell her through gritted teeth. "Don't stop."

"Righty-ho." It's so God-awfully cheesy that it's sexy, and I catch the brow arch and the smirk before her face disappears between my thighs once again, and I know I'm absolutely done.

Pete will never let me live this night down.

 

"Do you plan on sleeping tonight?"

Her breath is hot in my ear and she mouths and bites down on the lobe softly while pulling my body against hers. My next breath is shaky and I can't speak. I just kiss her neck and pretend the words I don't speak are absorbed into her skin.

"Maybe you'll get a day off tomorrow?" She questions. I shake my head because I highly doubt it, but at this point, I don't care if I get a single hour of sleep.

It's past two in the morning and our time together no longer seems limitless. I'm exhausted but I'm hanging on to her every touch and not giving her the chance to let go. Not that she would if I had.

"Maybe the Regents will all die in a fiery plane crash come morning?"

Only now do I sit back from her grasp to give her my best "don't go there" look. She smiles and laughs softly through her nose.

"I mean, except for Pete's mo..."

I only kiss her to stop her from saying what's she's going to say because in this moment, where I am straddling her lap, with my legs around her waist, and with her fingers trapped and motionless inside me as my body slowly recovers from the latest of our adventures, I don't want to talk about someone's mother.  Especially not a certain _someone's_ mother.

"Point taken." She smiles at the end of the kiss and pulls me back into her with her free hand. "You know, at some point, I'm going to need my hand back."

"Mine." It's all I say and I feel her laugh more than I can hear it.

"That it is."

"Just a little longer." Having found my voice, I set my forehead against hers and kiss her nose. "Helena."

"Of course."

I close my eyes and stay still in her grasp. Her free hand at the small of my back pulls my closer to her and I feel her lips against my shoulder. She kisses me there before brushing her lips softly across my collar bone, then down my chest to place a kiss over my heart.

"I'm afraid," she starts, leaning her head against my chest just then, "that sleep is going to win me over tonight."

"I didn't mean to keep you up." I whisper. She sits straight again to face me.

"Keeping me up." She says. "You don't seem to know how very good you are at doing that to me." Her lips are over mine now, her teeth gently biting down on my lower lip. She tugs at it and kisses there before kissing me fully and sighing when we part. "I do hope you can forgive me, Myka."

"Why? Are you going to Tesla me again?"

She doesn't laugh at my joke but slowly frees her hand of me and places it, moist and slick, over my thigh at her side. I whine softly, purposely, and kiss her. She pulls me in even closer now, to where our centers touch, and she slides her hands to my waist, leaving a glistening trail along the way, and holds tightly. As though if she lets go, I'll slip away.

"For who I am." She finally says. "For being so blinded by grief."

"Helena, stop." My arms are over her shoulders, around her neck, and I pull her into another kiss. "We're okay."

"Now we are." Tears slide down her cheeks. "But they haven't always been and they won't always be. You and I, we always seem to have trouble getting this right."

"What are you saying, Helena? It's right, right now."

"I mean to say that we are self-sabotaging." I don't think the revision of her explanation is entirely comforting. "We could have been fine in the beginning. Had we been this way in the beginning. But we're only this way when we know we can't be this way forever."

"Helena, without all of the bullshit from, you know, before now, we would not be _this_ way." I tell her. "We would be some washed out version of this with no background story to tell."

"Perhaps." She's averting her eyes now.

"Helena." I set my hands to her cheeks and draw her gaze back to me. "I like our history. Theatrical as it may be, we have saved each other from so much, from even ourselves. We are adventurers in this life and we have stories to tell. Good and bad, they're our stories."

She smiles just then and laughs softly, leaning her head back against my chest and holding me into her.

"I love you, Myka Bering, I truly do." She sighs. "But I need to close my eyes."

"I'll let you sleep." I kiss the hair at the top of her head and move to lift myself from the bed, but her hands on my waist pull me back into her.

"Oh no, I'm taking you with me."

I laugh as she lays back onto the bed, pulling me down with her slowly and keeping me close to her. When her head touches the pillow she closes her eyes and sighs sweetly, victoriously. I hover just over her, propped up with my elbows on either side of her head, and I watch her face relax as best as I can in the dark of the room.

Her breathing slows and grows heavier, and the smile on her face slowly softens into a smirk. She sighs and her hands, still on my waist, wrap fully around my abdomen.

"No kiss goodnight?" She's barely awake, the question is almost inaudible. I smile and set a chaste kiss against her lips.

"Goodnight, Helena Wells."

She laughs softly through her nose. "Somehow, you make me seem normal."

"You are not normal, Helena." I tell her. "You are HG Wells. And you are extraordinary."

"And that, my darling Myka, is why I like you."

  
***  
  


I dream about HG Wells in London, first the version that is Helena's brother and then the true HG Wells that is Helena.  I dream about Agent Wells at the B&B, determined to clear her good name, to return to the warehouse. Then the tormented Helena G Wells whose grief is forever immortalized on a rock in Yellowstone. Precious Emily Lake who accused me of having a school girl crush on her but apparently kept a photo of us in her bra. Holographic Helena who could only ever touch me with her pained expressions and thought better than to ask me to end her life for the second time within a wilderness.

I dream about Helena in China, forced to turn against her friends, against the only people left in this world that she loves, that love her, and having to face the idea that my life is, once again, in her hands.

Mostly, I dream about present Helena, whose intensity can be felt from every pore of her being. Helena who puts her entire heart into loving me, and uses all of her pain to please me. Helena who is usually resilient but can't stand completely on her own legs when my fingers and my lips find all of her weak spots and catalog them into the better parts of my memory. Helena, my lover.

The dream wreaks havoc on my emotions. I'm a combination of angry, sad, overwhelmingly happy, grieving, and aroused. Too many times I go back in my mind to revisit any one of these versions of this woman, and each of them comes with their own emotional triggers.

For the most part, I think of Emily, because she was the most genuinely unique, the one that I can't get back because Helena has no idea who she is or where she even came from. And I think, too, of Helena before Yellowstone, and the parts of her I always tried to decipher, in hindsight, as genuine or deceitful.

After this night, the line becomes too blurred because it all seems genuine. There's very little deceit, except for by omission of the knowledge that she was out to destroy the world.

Helena, as my lover, invades my dreams again in a funny way. She begins as Emily in Emily's teacher clothes, in Emily's classroom, and I'm standing by her desk as she chalks something illegible on the board. When she turns to me, she looks determined, she looks hungry. She calls me Miss Bering, she pulls the elastic band from her hair, setting the wretched ponytail free, and her cardigan follows it's trail to the floor behind her as she stalks toward me, determined.

The dream is frivolous. My mind has apparently been waiting for the opportunity to sleep. It uses the memories I've stored from the past two days and plays them out here. In the end, I take Helena atop her desk, throwing all of her tchotchkes and student papers to the floor and telling her how long I've been waiting to do that. She still calls me Miss Bering, my mind makes me believe I'm one of her students.

Student or not, I seem to know what I'm doing because she's not even touching me and I'm at the height peaking. She's telling me to keep going, to hold on, to open my eyes, but I'm certain they're not closed.

"I want to see those beautiful eyes." And her voice is suddenly more clear and so close. "Open your eyes, Myka." I cry because dream Helena begins slipping away and I can't let her go, I don't want it to end.

In my dream, the Regents come and take her and they don't care that we are doing what we're doing, they just rip her from my arms, dragging her from atop her desk, and out of the door, crying and screaming. And then suddenly, she's Emily again, so vulnerable and lost and scared.

"Emily." I try to yell but it's only a whisper.

"Not quite." Helena's voice is close again. "Open your eyes, Darling,"

I open my eyes to Helena's face, full of lust above me. She manages a coy smile, "Good morning."

I gasp at the sensation at my core that is suddenly so real and so close. I wrap my arms around Helena and pull her closer as she continues to pull me from sleep and into reality. I try to make sense of my surroundings, but all I can gather is we are still in bed, the sun is barely coming up, her fingers are inside of me.

"Emily?" She questions with a smile and never skipping a beat. I close my eyes. "Myka, please." She kisses me then. "Open your eyes." And I do.

Our eyes stay fixed until my body loses itself at her touch and with the finality of my release, and I bury my face into her neck, no longer able to hold back the burning wall of tears that I've been struggling against.

She snakes her arms around my waist and falls beside me on the bed, rolling me into her along the way. The fingers of her other hand find their way into my hair and she holds me tighter, it only makes me cry more. And I'm not even sure what I'm crying about. If it's the way Helena was so brutally taken from me a year ago, or Emily just now in my dreams with all of her helpless cries and useless self-defense classes.

Or if it's the sun rising on a night that I don't want to let go of completely, or the thought of Helena being taken away by another caravan of armed men and a self-appointed jury of Regents.

"I'm still here." Helena's voice brings me back to her and I kiss her neck to let her know I hear her. "Myka." She pulls my face up to hers and I'm sure the mess of tears and snot and crusted drool is how she'll remember me after the Regents come and take her away.

"You're right." I sob. "We have no time."

Her eyes are all over my face, bouncing from place to place before she leans her forehead to mine and closes them for a moment.

"We will make more time one day." She says softly. "Perhaps one day soon, Myka."

"I can't even imagine what they're planning to do with you now."

"Don't worry." She pulls me back into her and I rest my head against her shoulder.

"You've more than paid your dues, Helena. It's hardly fair that they can just snap their fingers and throw you into solitude."

"Myka, there is no solitude worse than a century in bronze. And I did that to myself." She sighs and kisses the top if my head. "Even as a projection, I still had the pleasure of your company."

"You seem to be really good at that."

"At what?"

"Punishing yourself." I lay my arm over her belly, resting my hand in the space between her exposed breasts.

"Another thing we seem to have in common." We both laugh quietly at that. She runs her hand over my arm, tracing fingertips softly across skin. "Tell me about Emily. You seem to have really gotten attached to her."

"Helena."

"I'm only curious."

I sigh.

"She was mostly useless." I tell her.

"And yet you say that with such endearment."

"She kissed me."

Helena is quiet at that, her hand stills.

"You kissed Emily?"

"I kissed _you_."

She laughs softly.

"She was a pain in my ass. For an hour of my life. That's it."

"But you mourn her?" Helena asks. "Ever since I returned to myself?"

"I'm sad for her. That she was someone entirely different, a whole person of her own, and now she's just gone."

"I _told_ Pete to destroy the coin."

"That's not _better_ , Helena." I prop myself up above her on my elbow and try not to sound so reprimanding. "Losing you was not an option. It's not a matter of you or her, it's the fact that they manufactured her to begin with."

"She wasn't really real, Myka." Helena says. "She was just me, brainwashed. My brain, my body, my thoughts but without my memories."

I shake my head and I'm smiling. "Not even close to your thoughts, Helena.  I mean, with the exception of me, I guess."

"You don't think she was the safer version of me? The me that I used to be before a world of so-called _endless wonder_ , before warehouse 12?" Helena's brows raise and I laugh a little at the comparison. "A less broken me that obviously still cared about you, that you could have potentially been happy with? With the coin destroyed."

"No." I say. "Are you asking me if I preferred her because she was normal or something?" She doesn't say anything, just looks at me. "No. The answer is no. Sykes did one great thing in his time in this world and that was bringing you, _you_ Helena, back to me."

She bites her lip and I don't resist the urge to kiss her. And when we part, I don't allow her the extra space between us. I close my eyes and I brush my lips gently across hers and I speak into her gasp.

"Even if just for one night, I have you, Helena."

She closes the distance between us in a deep kiss and we make love for the last time that day. The sun has risen and the smell of coffee and Leena's breakfast have already begun floating upstairs. It only acts as a reminder of how little time we have left together and when we reach our peaks simultaneously, every muscle in my body fails me and I break down in her arms.

She holds me close to her and spends nearly half an hour trying to calm my sobbing.

"Oh god, Helena." I cry. "This is happening again."

"We'll be okay." She says it in a way the reveals she doesn't truly believe it.

We hold each other close and I eventually fall asleep against the steady beat of her heart.

   
***  
  


Mrs. Frederic is the only one who comes for Helena that morning. There are no Regents, no armed guards, no too-touchy goons. Just Mrs. Frederic, her limo, and her scandalized driver, who doesn't bother coming out of the car or even turning it off.

Pete and Leena are here to say goodbye and Helena hugs them both individually, laughing only when Pete picks her clear up and off of the floor. They don't leave the B&B when I lead Helena outside behind Mrs. Frederic.

The older woman only looks back at us momentarily before she heads to the car and says, "Take your time."

Helena and I stand apart from each other and she's worrying her hand and looking at the ground as if she's expecting it to disappear from right beneath her.

"I'm running out of time." She says it under her breath.

"Helena?"

She looks up with red eyes and pulls me into her desperately, arms wrapped tightly around my abdomen and I return the hug and hold her closer. We both start to cry again and laugh at ourselves when we stand face to face in the arms of each other.

"We are impossible." I say quietly.

"You do this to me." She smiles. I laugh and wipe her tears from her face and she wipes at mine.

"Helena, last night," She watches me anxiously, her breath seems to catch in her throat, "this time with you, it's been..." Tears come again.

"It's okay." She moves her hands to the small of my back and pulls me into a deep kiss. When we part, she smiles and sets her forehead against mine. "We _will_ meet again." And this she seems sure of, but she's still not saying everything she seems to know.

"Oh, before I forget." I'm stepping back to reach into my pocket and pull out the locket she left behind in China. She smiles, taking the necklace from my hand and closing her fist around it.

"Myka." She's sighing and holds the necklace up to undo the clasp, then places it around my neck.

"Helena?" She smiles, her hands on my neck sends chills through me. I lift my hair out of the way as she steps behind me to secure the clasp again. Her fingers still for a moment before I feel her lips against my neck and she kisses my hair line.

She spins me around to face her and quietly admires the jewelry around my neck. The chain is so long that the locket itself is hidden in my shirt.

"It's okay, Myka." She smiles and reaches for the necklace she has around her own neck. "I happened to _acquire_ my other locket from the items I stole from myself back in London."

"But, she's your little girl."

"That locket means a lot to me, Myka. _You_ mean a lot to me." She wipes at tears. "There's no telling where I'll end up, so please just... just keep it for me."

She cups my cheeks then and pulls me into another deep kiss. When we part, she leaves several smaller kisses over my bottom lip, and kisses my cheek.

"I suppose I shouldn't keep her waiting any longer." Helena looks back at the limo and I'm suddenly struck with the finality of this moment.

"No, I suppose we shouldn't." I take Helena's hand and pull her determinedly to the limo.

"Myka?"

I pull the door open and tell Helena to get in, and she does but with the utmost sadness in her eyes, and I'm sure she thinks I'm rushing her away. But once she's seated, I tell her to scoot over and I all but throw myself into the seat beside her, causing her to invade Mrs. Fredric's personal space, and I shut the door behind me.

"Agent Bering?" Mrs. Frederic begins to question.

"I'm not here to stop you from taking Helena away from me, Mrs. Frederic." I start before she can. "If anything, I want to thank you for bringing her back to me in the first place. But I do have a demand of sorts."

"Myka, it's quite all right." Helena has her hands on my arms as if to calm me.

"No, no it's not, Helena." My eyes start to burn with unshed tears and I focus on Mrs. Frederic again. "Helena saved my life. She helped save the warehouse and I think she's more than paid for her past. She deserves far better treatment than the Regents have ever bothered to extend her. If I find out she's been bronzed, or brainwashed, or left in any other form of isolation again, I am _done_ with this life. I am _done_ with this warehouse."

"Agent Bering, I can assure you..."

"Pardon me, Mrs. Frederic, but I don't want your assurances. I want your promise." Her brows raise at my interruption and I'm sure she's somehow already conjuring up the paperwork to have me fired. "The next time I see this woman, she had better be whole and she had better be happy. Unbronzed, and not imprisoned in a bowling ball. And I _will_ see her again."

There's a long silence as I strain to keep my resolve against Mrs. Frederic's stoicism. I can't even begin to read her face, it's unchanged and unflinching, but for a second I think I see something change in her eyes, the slightest shift.

Helena's hands are in mine where they've been grasping tightly since I decided to roll on with my grand ultimatum. We're both staring anxiously at Mrs. Frederic and I don't think any of us are breathing. Even the driver seems to have stopped busying himself with the gauges in the car.

And then she nods. That's it. Just a simple nod and both Helena and I exhale. She turns to me but closes her eyes and leans in close. I wrap my arms around her and kiss her forehead, her cheeks, then the tip of her nose.

"Helena." I lift her face to mine with my finger under her chin and she opens her eyes. "Helena Wells." She swallows. "I love you, with all of my heart."

She breaks then. I can see it in her eyes, reddened by tears and exhaustion. She lets go of everything in this moment and her cheeks flood with more tears, she sobs. I place my palm fully over her cheek and run my thumb over tears that continue to fall.

"I have waited so long to hear you say..."

"I know."

"No," she shakes her head, "you have no idea. But you will. In about thirty seconds."

She's speaking cryptically and it's far over my head, but I don't even care. Whatever she's telling me, I can't be bothered trying to decipher her and all the things she never says.

I pull her into me and kiss her, gently at first, but then it's needy because we know this is it for a long while and it needs to be enough. It needs to say the goodbye that we can rarely bring ourselves to actually say. And it does.  It says everything.

I kiss her again when we part, and again, and then again, because I can't let go. And on our last kiss, I lower my hands to her waist and her entire body shudders and she tenses up, momentarily.  But then relaxes into the touch and brings her hands up to cup my face.

When we part, she's looking at me impossibly, with wild eyes and questioning. Her cheeks completely flushed and her breathing staggered.

"Myka?"

It's the way she says my name, with renewed lust, that pulls me to some sense that is desperate to not linger here and drag out this farewell for longer than necessary.

"Goodbye, Helena."

I open the door and unfold myself from the car just as she calls my name again.

"Myka, wait. Myka, where are you..." She's fighting against the seat belt I managed to latch her into while we were still kissing. It allows me to see her for two seconds longer, even if her face is desperate and lost. "Myka, don't go! Please, Myka?" I close both the door and my eyes on the image of her simultaneously.

The doors lock then. It sounds threatening, hostile, and for a second, I worry that I'm sending her off to another fate far worse than death. But without the lock, this goodbye would be almost as endless as the warehouse itself. And at this point, I can't help but trust Mrs. Frederic.

Helena is still crying my name through the closed window, and when I dare to open my eyes, even through the tint, I can see those desperate brown orbs and the palm of her hand against glass. As the limo begins exiting the drive, her cries stop and she just stares at me with something I can only describe as fresh abandonment.

Like she never saw this coming, like we haven't spent the past twenty-two hours saying goodbye to one another with every inch of our bodies.

I close my eyes again, trying to burn that look from my memory, but it's useless. The car turns onto the road and drives out of sight, away from the B&B, and away from the warehouse.

I tug at the chain around my neck and pull the locket into my hand, grasp it tightly, press it to my lips, kiss it, and whisper softly into it.

"I love you."


End file.
